Saxophonist, composer, music journalist. Majors on tenor and soprano saxophones. Also sings and plays guitar, pennywhistle, harmonica, & various percussion instruments.

HELMUT LIPSKY - Violinist, Composer and Artistic Director of Melosphere Productions

Violinist Helmut Lipsky is the prototype of the accomplished musician of today: born in Germany, raised in Switzerland in the tradition of classical music, he went on to study with the great masters, including Itzhak Perlman, in New York City, where Lipsky developed as an improviser and composer. He lives now in Montreal, Canada and is very active on the national and international scene.

His mix of musical languages (jazz, tango, classical, popular and traditional music of other cultures), solidifies Lipsky’s very personal and identifiable style. He has recorded several critically acclaimed albums and has been nominated twice in Canada for Felix awards for Best CD, Best Canadian Violinist and Best Concert of the Year. He has collaborated with the likes of GRAMMY winners Swiss harpist Andreas Vollenweider and American cellist David Darling.

His latest album with his group Melosphere, called "Tempi con Variazioni", which includes guest artist soprano Suzie LeBlanc and was produced by Earl McCluskie for the Chestnut Hall Label, garnered the prestigious Prix OPUS by the CQM (Conseil Québécois de la Musique) and can be found on iTunes, eMusic, CDBaby and Amazon.com.

Lipsky has performed in many countries at prestigious events, such as the Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland, Berlin’s Summer Festival, Toronto's IdeaCity Conference, the Montreal International Jazz Festival and the International Very Special Arts Festival at the Royal Palace in Brussels, Belgium and has opened for artists like Dave Brubeck, Stéphane Grappelli and Toots Thielemans.

He has written, interpreted and produced music for cinema, television, theatre and multimedia installations. Special events, like his Concerto for violin and chainsaw, which premiered at the opening of the international Symposium of Contemporary Arts in Amos, and a Harbour Symphony-Concerto for amplified violin, shiphorns, train and cathedral bells at the Montreal Harbourfront, brought his eclectic style to international attention. Sheet music of his works have been published by Doberman Editions and Ovationpress.com.

Helmut Lipsky teaches classical violin at the Conservatoire de Musique de Montreal, jazz violin at Concordia University and gives master classes in performance and improvisation throughout Quebec and Europe. He has degrees in Performance and Pedagogy from the Conservatory of Zurich, Switzerland, and a Master’s degree from the City University of New York.

Lipsky’s numerous awards include the Order of French Music, the Presidential Scholar Award of the Council of the City of New York and First Prize at the international radio broadcast competition "Jazz à la Carte".

The Melosphere is the realm where there are no boundaries between musical languages — a space where Jazz, Classical, Tango, Latin, Gypsy, Rock, and music from various past and present world cultures interact to create a vibrant and fascinating sound, structured by programmatic and narrative elements.

Violinist, composer and bandleader Helmut Lipsky created the foundation for his very personal sound while still in his teens in Switzerland. He nurtured it during his six years of studies in New York City and further cultivated it after moving to the province of Québec, Canada, in 1980, where he founded his first Mélosphère Ensemble with musicians from Québec City: Yves Léveillé (piano and keyboards),Daniel Charron (saxophone), Gérard Paradis (bass) and François Samson (drums).

Reconstituted in Montréal with Simon Stone (saxophone), James Gelfand (piano), Bernard Marchand (synthesizers), Marc Langis (bass), James Hillman (drums),Pierre Dubé (percussion) and guest vocalist Karen Young, the group recorded the album Mélosphère for the CBC Jazzimage label in 1986. The group appeared at the Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland in 1987 and, until the late eighties, was a regular guest at the Festival International de jazz de Montréal and many other major Canadian festivals.

The Mélosphère Ensemble also collaborated with artists as diverse as classical flutist André-Gilles Duchemin (Trois Images, Suite for Flute and Jazz Ensemble) and popular singer Sylvie Tremblay (theme songs for Leucan and the international Very Special Arts Festival in Brussels in 1994).

Since the mid-90s, Helmut Lipsky has collaborated in Canada and Europe in numerous concert and recording projects with Berlin-based L’Art de passage musicians Stefan Kling (piano) and Tobias Morgenstern (accordion). Together they recorded Helmut Lipsky’s CD Moontide and introduced the music of Tango Nuevo master Astor Piazzolla into their repertory.

The new Mélosphère Ensemble includes these musicians plus Jean-Francois Martel (bass), Pierre Tanguay (percussion) and Alex Weimann (keyboards), and collaborates with the renowned Canadian Baroque soprano Suzie LeBlanc.

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